International arrest warrants for bomb suspects

By DANIEL TROTTA

MADRID - Spain identified a Moroccan Islamist organisation as the prime suspect in its probe of the Madrid train bombings yesterday, and sources said a judge would issue five international arrest warrants in the case.

"Investigators at this point place a priority on the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group," Interior Minister Angel Acebes told a news conference.

"No other options are ruled out, but the investigations are going especially in this direction."

It was the first time Spain had linked a specific group to the bombings since the Government hastily - and, as it turned out, mistakenly - blamed the Basque separatist group ETA immediately after the March 11 attack that killed 191 people.

The judge in charge of the case, Juan del Olmo, has decided to issue international arrest warrants for five people believed to have carried out the bombings or played a supporting role, sources close to the investigation said.

The blasts on four packed commuter trains came three days before Spain's general elections and played a role in the surprise victory by the opposition Socialists, removing a strongly pro-American party from power.

The shadowy Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group is believed to be tied to Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network, and the US State Department says its goals include "establishing an Islamic state in Morocco and supporting al Qaeda jihad [holy struggle] against the West".

The group has been investigated for a connection to the Casablanca bombings last May, in which 12 suicide bombers and 33 others were killed. The Spanish probe into the train bombings has suspected a Casablanca link almost from the start.

Other speculation from private investigators and press reports has pointed to radical clerics and known al Qaeda operatives from around Europe and the Arab world.

Spain is holding 18 suspects in the case: 11 Moroccans, three Syrians, two Spaniards and two Indians. Acebes said more arrests could come soon.

Sources close to the investigation said six witnesses had identified three of the suspects under arrest as having been on the doomed trains on the morning of the attacks.

Earlier yesterday the judge formally accused a Syrian of a central role in the attacks based in part on two witness identifications, including one from a person who was wounded in the blasts, court sources said.

Three Moroccans under arrest also are believed to have planted the bombs, which were hidden in sports bags and set off by mobile phones connected to detonators.

Investigators speculate that as few as six or seven people were needed to place 14 rucksack bombs on the four trains. Besides the 10 bombs that exploded, three were blown up in controlled explosions and one was recovered, providing crucial evidence.

Acebes placed "special importance" on a house outside Madrid that may have been used to assemble the bombs and plot the attacks.

Sources close to the investigation said police found a trove of evidence there.

Investigators say they have been astonished by the amount of evidence left behind at the house and elsewhere, but are equally wary that small-time criminals rather than highly trained operatives may have committed such an atrocity.

Acebes said several of those under arrest had neither criminal records nor any known prior contact with radical Islamists, and that they may have been "recruited" for the job.

- REUTERS